Forever and Always
by MyVeryWildImagination
Summary: [FOR KATNISSCAHILL'S CONTEST] When Sinead builds a time machine, a whack on Dan's head caused for the whole gang to be swept off to 2001, in World Trade Center, just before it is hit by maniac terrorists. Even worse, they are on a very high floor, and the time machine needs at least 20 mins to cool down. Will they survive? [ONE-SHOT]


Forever and Always

"It's nearly done!" Sinead screamed at Amy, Ian, Dan, and Natalie as she twisted another random piece of metal.

The others whooped in joy. They had been waiting for a long time, and couldn't wait to test out Sinead's new invention. What was it?

It was a time machine. Armed with lots of ultra-cool gadgets and painted in blue with the Ekatrina crest on it. It was beautiful. Amy's mouth dropped open, and then closed with a click when Dan whacked it back up, mumbling something about her looking like a fish. Amy rubbed her jaw. Glaring at him, she pulled his trousers up, much to Dan's dismay, who stepped away from her.

After a few more grunts and twists, Sinead was done. Everybody eagerly dashed into the machine after a moment of admiration, and closed the door. They looked at the controls in awe. Nobody spoke for a moment until Sinead said:

"Now where shall we go?"

But before anyone could say anything, Natalie whacked Dan into the controls suddenly, slamming him face-first into a certain set of buttons. Sinead's eyes opened in shock and screamed out urgently:

"Natalie, you idiot!"

Before she could say anything else, the machine began to vibrate, and then suddenly started to whirl around and around. It reminded Amy of those little teacup rides in Disneyland that Dan made her ride.

It was not a nice journey at all. The time-machine was very crowded, and poor Ian and Natalie, not used to trips, turned a pale shade of green as the time machine spun around and around, lurching side to side.

Amy grabbed onto the handholds, glaring at Natalie for randomly hitting Dan. Amy knew that the two hated each other, but Natalie was just being ridiculous. It was a time machine, for heaven's sake! You DO NOT randomly whack someone, no matter if he's your sworn enemy, into a wall of buttons.

Natalie's face was turning into a dark green rapidly. Amy stared at Dan, who was munching on a Twix bar. Her idiot brother was completely disregarding that they could die brutally any minute.

When Dan saw how Natalie looked, he looked around, before grabbing a bag filled with his discarded wrappers, and handed it to Natalie. Natalie, even though she was about to be sick, had the nerve to look at Dan suspiciously before suddenly heaving and vomited into the sack.

Ian (who had recovered slightly from his headache because Amy had comforted him a little), Amy, and Sinead watched Natalie and Dan with amusement. The things that younger siblings could do. When Dan caught the trio watching, he shot a glare at them before turning his attention back to Natalie.

"You snobby British dudette," Dan hissed once Natalie finished emptying her stomach. "I gave you a bag to be nice, and guess what you do? Look at me suspiciously like I'm planning to kill you with it."

Natalie snorted. "For all I know, _dude_, the toxic waste from your disgusting saliva in the bag could've killed me."

Dan stared at her in disbelief. "Toxic waste?" he spluttered.

Before Natalie could retort and start an everlasting argument (again), Sinead interrupted. "You pigheads haven't even noticed that the time machine's stopped, have you?"

Dan and Natalie's heads snapped towards Sinead. Amy noted with amusement that they've forgotten Sinead was there.

"It's stopped?" Ian asked, looking out the window. Dan and Natalie squished themselves up to the windows, trying to catch a glance out of the time machine, but neither succeeded as they were both too busy attempting to fight off each other.

Amy, Ian, and Sinead casually walked out of the time machine, as Dan and Natalie began to poke each other in their annoyance. When the two finally noticed that the rest of the gang had gone out, they huffed at each other before clambering out of the time machine.

Amy gave a ridiculously loud gasp when she noticed where they were. Sinead gasped too, and clamped onto Amy.

Dan, Natalie, and Ian stared at Amy and Sinead, having no clue of where they were. When Amy and Sinead noticed that the rest were gaping at them instead of their surroundings, Amy's excitement died down and she sighed in annoyance at her companions.

"Idiots," she huffed. "You know where we are?"

Dan gave her a look. "No."

Amy rolled her eyes. "We're in the World Trade Center."

"…Huh?" Dan replied.

Amy sent a glare his way. "The World Trade Center are two buildings, The Twin Towers, you egghead! It was extremely famous, and we must be in the time before it collapsed! You know, from the attack! You have to…"

Dan tuned out Amy's lecture. Ian and Natalie had been silent throughout the whole ordeal.

"Do you know what time and date it is?" Dan asked Sinead. Amy, noticing that Dan wasn't listening to her, stopped talking and glared at him instead. Again.

Sinead checked her gadget for keeping track of the time, which she must have built with the time machine. "It's…" she stopped suddenly. "Amy."

Amy turned her attention to Sinead. "Yeah?"

"It's September…" Sinead paused for dramatics. "Eleventh. And the time is eight thirty-five."

Amy gave an exaggerated gasp. "Oh my god!"

Ian raised an eyebrow. "Is it your birthday or something, love?"

Amy gave him a look that was mixed with 'Duh!', 'Idiot!' and 'No!' "Today's the day when the Twin Towers were destroyed! It's two thousand and one, right?"

Sinead nodded.

Natalie snapped her fingers. "Ian, don't you remember Mother saying that there was a lot of fashion opportunities here before it collapsed?"

Ian waved his hands in front of Natalie's face. "Do you think I would care about that?"

"Yes," was Natalie's reply.

Exasperated, Ian turned back to Amy and Sinead. "Where are we, anyway?"

Amy gaped at him. "Were you not listening to anything we just said?" She pointed her finger at the floor. "This-" point. "-tower is-" point. "-going to collapse-" point. "-soon."

Ian snorted in annoyance. "I know that, dimwit." He paused. "I mean, love. I meant which floor? Does the base of the Twin Towers collapse? If we're in the base, then it's more likely that we won't get hit."

"Look out the window, Ian. It's obvious we're very high off the ground."

"I know that, but-"

"We're wasting time here!" Sinead shouted. "If you can't understand, here, let me simplify. We. Going To. Be Dead. Very soon if you idiotsdon'tevacuatenow!"

The last sentence was blurred together. Amy had trouble understanding, but she got the gist of it.

After a while of confusion and shouting, they all managed to grasp the facts.

Fact 1: They were in the World Trade Center.

Fact 2: They were on the 56th floor, a pretty high one.

Fact 3: Terrorists were going to crash the building in approximately 5 minutes.

Fact 4: They were all going to die, unless they managed to scramble out of the building in what, parachutes?

Dan, being Dan, asked, "Why can't we just go back in the time machine?"

Amy sighed. "First of all, what if Natalie decides to bonk you on the head again and we end up being chomped up by dinosaurs?" Natalie glared at Amy for that comment. "Second, the time machine needs to cool down for at least twenty minutes before we use it again. Didn't you read the guide?"

Dan snorted. "No one read the guide."

"I did," Ian supplied.

"Well, we all know that you read it to kiss Amy's butt," Dan retorted. Ian's face turned slightly red, but he turned away from Dan instead of launching Dan outside of the building. Without a parachute.

Amy's face was red too, and turned even more scarlet when Dan being to sing, "Amy and Ian, sitting in a tree. K-I-S-S-I-N-G. First comes-"

Sinead interrupted. "Plane, second comes dead, and third comes we need to get out of here."

"That didn't rhyme," Dan quipped.

Sinead, tired of lollygagging, sighed. "Come on, we have to get out of here. We'll have to go down the stairs-" Dan protested, but Sinead ignored him. "-just in case the elevator catches fire while we're in it, so you guys need to hurry your butts up."

The group headed towards the stairs, ignoring looks from other people, who were probably wondering why a crazy-looking bunch of teenagers were going to take the stairs instead of going down the elevator.

Amy swore she heard someone say, "Kids these days."

While they were walking down the stairs, Amy wanted to strangle herself because of the group's embarrassing posture. Dan jumped down the stairs five by five, like a monkey on a sugar rush; while Natalie put her hands on her hips and stuck out her leg dramatically everytime she took a step. Ian held his head up high (Amy wondered if his neck hurt), looking like an honourable British officer.

While Amy and Sinead walked normally, of course.

Suddenly, something hit Amy. "Oh my god!" she gasped. The others turned to look at Amy (Not Dan, thankfully. He was in the middle of leaping down five steps while screaming like a madDan.). Amy gave them a look. "We have to tell everyone what'll happen! Then we can save thousands of lives!"

Ian agreed immediately. Dan instantly snorted, and mouthed, _Butt kisser_, to Ian. Ian turned scarlet.

Natalie rolled her eyes. "What are we going to tell them, huh? That we travelled here in a time machine and terrorists are going to kill everyone? They're just going to call the white men in suits to come and take us to the mental wards."

Amy looked stricken. "Natalie! We must! Think about it! Saving thousands of lives would be terrific, wouldn't it? Think of all the lives that won't be wasted because of crazy terrorists!"

Ignoring everyone's protests and weird looks, Amy barged past them and threw open the door to the fiftieth floor. Just as she stepped in, with the others trailing behind her, a loud bang was heard and everyone dropped the floor in panic.

It was starting.

"We need to _go_!" Dan yelled.

"You think I don't know that?" Amy screamed back.

"Shut up!" Sinead shouted. "I have the time machine!"

"_How_?" Ian and Natalie shrieked, all British manners forgotten now.

"I created this gadget!" Sinead paused. "Oh my god, the building is going to collapse soon! We can't take the elevator! I think twenty minutes have gone by, we can take the time machine!"

Pandemonium ensued.

"Let's go!" Dan shouted again, and grabbed Natalie's hand, starting to drag her towards the time machine, which Sinead had opened up again. Natalie struggled, using her makeup as ammunition since she had forgotten her dart gun in the time machine, but eventually Natalie gave up and let Dan drag her towards the machine. Sinead headed towards it too, but stopped dead when she spied Amy and Ian in the crowd, unable to reach the time machine because of the people pushing against them.

Amy could feel panic rising in her chest. She desperately wanted to live, wanted her friends to stay and help. But she couldn't be selfish, not now. "Go!" she screamed.

Someone entwined their hand into hers: Ian. She threw a grateful smile at him, before herding an old man into the staircase that remained intact.

She had to say goodbye to Dan. Amy grabbed a random video camera of a tourist, recorded her message, and, using all the volleyball skills her P.E. teacher had drilled into her head, threw the camera into the time machine. Before Sinead followed Amy's orders and closed the door, Amy saw that Sinead had caught the camera.

Amy clung onto Ian, weeping. "We're gonna die," she wailed.

"How eloquently put," Ian replied dryly. Amy punched him lightly for being this light-hearted when they were going to die.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw that the South Tower was falling as well. Had it been so long? Seventeen minutes had to have already passed for the other tower to have been hit as well.

Amy tore herself away from Ian with difficulty. "We have to help more people," she breathed. Ian heard her somehow over the noise, nodded, and began to order more people into the remaining intact staircase. People followed him gladly, happy to have someone in control, and began to cram themselves into the staircase.

Amy watched as strangers helped strangers and the young helped the old into the staircase. It had never happened in the 39 Clues Hunt, even though she wished it did.

Amy now realized that she would miss Dan terribly, no matter how idiotic he could act sometimes. She would miss Ian and Sinead too, when she died, and maybe even Natalie. Just a little.

The last thing Amy heard before she died was Ian's voice.

He had said, 'I love you.'

She wished that she had enough time to say it back.

* * *

Dan watched in horror out of the window as the South Tower collapsed. Sinead had tweaked with the engine a little, making it stay in the air for around an hour before it started time travelling again. Dan almost wished she hadn't, though, when he saw the North Tower collapse as well.

Amy.

Dan had to fight to not let out a sob, reminding himself that ninjas don't cry. Next to him, Natalie was bawling her eyes out, which didn't help strengthen his resolve to not burst into tears. Amy was gone forever now, unless some freak miracle happened and she would be waiting at home with cookies.

Sinead was behind him, motionless. He could feel her eyes on the window. As the North Tower's flames went up again into the sky, Dan could spot fire trucks approaching the building.

_They wouldn't be able save a lot of people_, Dan thought sadly. _Amy told me_. He realized his subconscious had heard Amy babbling about the Twin Towers. Dan wished that he had listened to her more; after all, he should've been a better brother.

Suddenly, he remembered the video camera. He was the first one out of the trio to move in two hours, when he grabbed the camera with trembling fingers. Slowly, he lifted it up to his face, and pressed the power button. Then the 'View Captured Photos/Videos' button. And finally, the play button.

Amy's face appeared on the small screen. "Dan, I'm so sorry," she yelled over the noise. "I didn't get to say goodbye properly. But just know that I love you!"

"I am not a butt kisser," Ian yelled from the side. "But I'll miss you, Daniel! And Natalie," Natalie and Sinead were watching the video with him now. "I'll miss you too. Thanks for being such a good best friend for Amy, Sinead."

Amy said something again: "I'll always love you!" and then the video ended.

Sinead sniffed, her first time of showing sorrow in the time machine, and Natalie burst into a fresh round of tears, and started to wipe her running mascara off her cheeks.

To no one in particular, Dan whispered, "I'll always love you too, Amy."

_Forever and always_.

**MyVeryWildImagination: Hey everybody! I hope you enjoyed this story! This was Co-written with Carolina Martinez from FictionPress, a good friend of mine. We had SUCH a good time writing it. ****(Including rolling around the floor laughing.)** It was both humorous and angsty. See if you can spot the transition between those two genres. Anyways, this is for KatnissCahill's time-machine contest. 

**Check out Carolina's stories on FictionPress!**

**-Wild-**

**Carolina Martinez: Well, that was angsty. I felt so awkward writing it. Wild next to me kept laughing like a maniac when she got to the funny parts. By the way, I don't post my stuff on Fanfiction, so please go to FictionPress to check out my stories. You know you want to :) *puppy dog eyes* And yes, I know how ridiculously long my penname is. *Wild: So is mine! Mine is longer!* *Carolina Martinez: Yeah, but mine's a proper name. Yours is just a ridiculous string of words.* *Wild: Just shut up!***

**That really happened, by the way. Just now. She's right next to me.**

**Okay, I'm going to shut up now. *Wild: Yeah, good thing!* Hope you enjoyed!**


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